GOP Weekly Address: It’s Time to Build Keystone XL, Says Rep. Terry

United States Congress(WASHINGTON) — In this week’s Republican address, Rep. Lee Terry of Nebraska calls on lawmakers to get moving to build the Keystone XL Pipeline, a project the congressman insists will help lower energy bills and create tens of thousands of American jobs.

Terry says taking on the high energy bills has become “especially important” as gas prices are taking an even bigger toll on commuters and truckers.

“That’s why I’ve led the efforts in the House to support the Keystone XL Pipeline, a project that would bring more North American energy to the marketplace and put thousands to work. All told, Keystone will create roughly 20,000 new jobs related to the construction of the pipeline. And it will create another 118,000 jobs downstream,” Terry explains.

But, Terry says, “[d]espite all of that, the Obama administration continues to block Keystone, using every bureaucratic trick and excuse in the book. It’s now been more than 1,600 days since the initial permits were filed for building the pipeline. To put that in perspective, it took the United States a little more than 1,300 days to win World War II, and it took Lewis and Clark about 1,100 days to walk the Louisiana Purchase and back.”

With the Keystone project having passed several environmental reviews and gained the support of unions and employers, Terry calls it a “no-brainer.”

“The people and the Congress have spoken. The experts have weighed in. Now it’s the time to build the Keystone pipeline. No more delays, no more politics. If the president continues to drag his feet, Congress is prepared to act,” he says.

As usual an ill-informed or lying politician lies to his constituents, Keystone is not designed to lower prices for the American consumer, its designed to increase prices. The Koch brothers want to stop the bottleneck in the Mid-West of the Canadian oil sand crude, which has lowered prices in the Mid-West, the pipeline will free up that bottleneck. Also, the oil is designed to get to the Texas gulf coast refineries to be processed for OVERSEAS sales, and will not help or lower costs for American consumers. As far as being safe, you just have to look at the Exxon Arkansas spill that just now happened. If a major company like Exxon can have a major spill of heavy Canadian crude, what do you think a corrupt company like the Koch brothers will do to prevent a spill.

Congressman Terry is correct. It’s time to get KeystoneXL approved. It will create thousands of jobs, generate billions in revenue and strengthen America’s energy security by supplying us with an additional 830,000 barrels of oil per day. It’s a project the majority of the American people want, as it enjoys broad, bipartisan support nationwide (as
high as 70% according to some polls). And it’s important to keep in mind that pipelines are the safest way to transport oil, with the lowest spill rate of any form of conveyance.